Exalted Character Conversions
I must immediately stress that this is not a Player Character conversion guide, but rather one for generating antagonists and other NPCs from the original Exalted material. Such conversions are not 1:1 (that is, there will be some necessary losses) but there should be enough that an experienced GM should be able to fill in any of the blanks. Also note that this is predominantly for conversions from Exalted Second edition, as that's the version of exalted with the most varied statblocks. Philosophy of Conversion Before we dive too deeply into the conversion tables, allow me to explain some of the similarities between the mechanics that are at play here, and how conversion between the two is even possible. When a test is called for, Exalted's system takes an attribute and an ability, which are both typically rated 1-5, and adds their values together to give a dice pool. All of the exalted dice are effectively black-shaded (that is, they almost always have a 50% success rate), but this leads to some huge dice pools and terrible scaling in the late-game. BW elegantly avoids this issue with it's shading mechanic; which keeps the vast majority of obstacles and exponents in the 1-10 range. (Though with enough advantage dice, or artha, one can quite easily end up rolling more than 10 dice. Still, it's better than the regular 20+ dice pools that you see in Exalted.) When we look at the individual numbers and what they mean, as they're described in Exalted and BW respectively, we find that: Exalted puts rank 1 as feeble, rank 2 as average, rank 3 as excellent, rank 4 as the peak of human ability, and rank 5 or above as something only attainable by supernatural beings. Burning Wheel on the other hand says that 4 is the "human number", and that 8 is the highest attainable stat by a human. This gives us a good starting point for making conversions. But as you'll see below, we don't just double the numbers, and shades only come in when we reach values of 6 and above. Abilities "Abilities" are Burning Wheel's catch-all term for anything with an exponent and a shade, but we immediately run into some confusion because abilities is also Exalted's term for the analogue of skills. Similarly, "attributes" in BW are those abilities derived from "stats", but attributes in Exalted are the analogue of stats. There are some other crossover terms too, such as "traits". To help avoid ambiguity, we will be using italics to denote mechanics from the Exalted books. Attributes = Stats Exalted's attributes are broken into three categories: Physical, Social, and Mental, most of which have a direct analogue in BW: Note: * Speed is a weird one because it's one of the most-tested abilities in Fight and RnC, and functions sort of like a mix between Initiative or Join Battle ''and ''Dodge DV. We're also quite generous by choosing the highest of the three, because if we chose the lowest then this would double dip on rounding down when we calculate Reflexes (below). Once you have some exalted numbers for all your stats, it's time to convert them into BW numbers: Following the guidelines outlined in the shades section of the Exalt Burner, one should only shade-shift if it suits the type of creature being converted. For example, on Ex2 pg 350 we see creatures with a Strength of 14. But these are mortal beasts, and so in the language of BW these have, at most, a B10 in Power. Reflexes, Steel, Health, & the PTGS * Once you have calculated the creatures Perception, Speed, and Agility (from the tables above), you can work out their Reflexes using the usual BW rules (pg 90). * Steel is calculated by either answering the steel questions as per usual, or just using the Wits + Integrity ''(without doubling and assigning a shade based on the creature-type. * Similarly, Health can be calculated as per the usual rules, or by taking the ''Resistance + Integrity ''and assigning a shade. * The PTGS is calculated using the usual BW rules too, but keep an eye out in the creatures description for "Ox-Body Technique" which functions as a trait that adds +1 to their Mortal Wound each time they take it. Intelligence & Appearance Burning Wheel doesn't really have a way to measure a character's intelligence or appearance except through Traits. So, using the above mentioned "2 = average human" in exalted, we can come up with some analogous traits for the 5 most common ranks: ''Abilities ''= Skills The doubling trend does not continue when we come to skills. This is because BW uses a halved Stat as a Root for skills. Again this is about keeping a head on the numbers more than anything, but basically, for a quick conversion: Each ''ability is usually broad enough to cover a whole range of skills. The number associated with each ability may be considered to be a number of lifepath skill points that may be allocated to any of the listed associated skills, so long as it makes sense for the character. The ability-to-skill conversions are as follows (the table may help you to determine subdomains for Essence): Notes: : * If Athletics is higher than Strength then give the creature a trait that grants the difference as bonus dice to Power when performing "feats of strength" (such as bending metal bars, lifting a cart, or breaking down a wall). : ** If Resistance is higher than Stamina then give the creature the Tough or Fortitude trait (whichever will help their PTGS the most). If it is 3 or more points higher then give them the Wolverine trait as well. Clearly, the skill ranges above are not evenly split. Some of Exalted's abilities are highly specific, like Ride, while others are really quite broad, like Craft. This is an unavoidable facet of the conversion process, and it will leave strange artefacts such as almost every converted character having the Observation skill open. Prioritise the exceptions when there is a cross-over within the skill-ranges. That is, for example, Throwing is a Ranged Martial skill, but it is specifically tied to the Thrown ability, so a point in Archery cannot be used to open Throwing (or Slings or Blowpipes). Essence Willpower